Saoirse
by Elaine989
Summary: Since when has a little thing like being dead ever stopped you from doing anything?
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own anybody...yet

Set sometime after season 3. Not sure if it will take into account anything that happened in the show after that.

Angel stirred in his sleep. _Something's not right_ he thought but he couldn't place it.

It was like a niggling feeling in the back of his head, and it was getting stronger. It pulsed like a heart beat.

He swung his feet onto the floor and pulled on a shirt. He was wide awake now. His senses fine tuned to what could only be the feel of magic. Half-way to the hotel lobby it hit him.

A powerful shock wave ripped through the hotel scattering furniture and blowing out all the glass in the weapons cabinets. Angel was flung backwards onto the floor.

_What the…_

A strong smell of ozone hung in the air. And it was quiet.

_Too quiet._

Angel got to his feet and staggered into the landing overlooking the almighty crack resounded abound the spacious room. Electricity crackled and the hairs on the back of Angel's neck were on end.

He stared as a rip in reality appeared out of no where, crackling with power and raw energy. He thought he could hear the faint sounds of a fight beyond the tear.

And then two bodies accompanied by a pair of rucksacks tumbled out of the portal, landing in a heap on the hotel floor. One of the bodies jumped up and faced the portal. A bloody wrist flashed through the air. A few droplets of the blood were sucked into the portal. It shuddered and then winked out of existence as if it had never been. The hooded figure that had closed the portal shuddered and crumpled to the ground.

By then the second body was standing. He was slight with angular features and deepest blue eyes topped off with messy black hair. A grin was spread across his tired looking face. "Angel" he said with that unmistakable Irish accent, "Well you just going to stand there gapin' or you gona help us?"

Angel stood there with his mouth hanging open, his brain trying to process what his eyes were telling him was standing in front of him.

Doyle.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Don't own anybody but Saoirse

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Doyle walked over to where the other figure lay as Angel slowly made his way down the stairs.

"How'd you...where'd....You're dead." the vampire finally came out with.

"All will be explained in good time Angel-man. Could you give us a hand?"

Doyle was hunkered down beside his companion and had pulled back the hood that had been covering their face. Angel looked down into the face a girl. She was in her late teens. Dark hair spilled to her shoulders. Had she been standing she would have been tall for a girl. Her eyes were closed and her skin was very pale.

"She okay?"

"She should be. Opening inter-dimensional portals sure takes a lot out of ye. Bit o' rest and she'll be grand."

Angel scooped the sleeping girl up into his arms. Blood from her hand dripped to the floor.

"There's a first aid kit in the office."

The Bracken demon nodded and hurried to find it. Now that the shock of seeing a friend he thought long dead had started to fade Angel noticed something else. The coppery tang of blood filled his nostrils. It was intoxicating. He could feel the girl's heart beat against his chest, pumping her blood around her body. He stared down at her cut palm and the redness that was pooled in it. It hummed to him. It sang to him of strength and an overwhelming sense of power.

"Her blood.." he called, looking up to see Doyle standing in the doorway of the office, first aid kit in hand. "She's not human." It wasn't a question.

Doyle shook his head. "I'll explain properly later but no she's not." He grabbed the two rucksacks and followed Angel up the stairs.

Angel gently placed the girl on his bed and stepped back as Doyle cleaned and bandaged her hand. There was something familiar about her but he couldn't place it. Her blood puzzled him. The only blood he'd come across anywhere near that powerful had been Slayer's blood. Yet even that fell short of this girl.

Angel crossed his arms over his chest as Doyle sat on the end of the bed.

"Explanation time right?"

The vampire nodded. "You might wana pull up a chair."

Angel sat in the armchair opposite Doyle, his face a mask. "I saw you die. Years ago."

Doyle looked down at his feet then back up at Angel. "We had to find a reality where either of us didn't already exist or where dead. Else the portal wouldn't have worked and we'd both be dead now."

Angel nodded slowly. He was familiar with portals.

"What reality are you from then?"

"Similar to this one in many ways. Though time moves faster in ours. Eighteen years ago a war started. The forces of darkness slowly gaining ground inch by inch. But we had something they desperately wanted." He nodded at the girl.

"You feel the power that flows through her. You probably more than most. When she was born we put every kind of protection around her. Magical and otherwise. Problem was though they ran out once she turned eighteen. They attacked the day she did. Everyone was killed. Her parents, Willow, Giles, Wes...We're the only two left." Doyle paused for a moment. They were painful memories and still fresh. But Angel needed to know the story.

The girl murmured something in her sleep. Angel's eyes widened.

"Was that Irish?"

"Aye man. We took her to your old home. Back to Ireland where it was easier to keep her safe. And it was good for a few years. All happy families and all that jazz. But the contingency plan was always in place. One day we'd have to use it. And that was today hence the ending up on your hotel floor a short while ago."

Angel studied Doyle. He looked tired and faint traces of grey were beginning to show in his hair.

"What's her name?"

"Saoirse" Doyle replied.

_Saoirse_. Angel's lips twitched up at that. _Fitting to name the child freedom_.

"What is she?"

Doyle grinned. "Thought you'd never ask. Our girl's the result of a night of passion between our realties version of one Buffy Summers, Vampire Slayer, and your goodself. By all laws of biology she should exist but hey mystical pregnancies are hardly a new thing eh?"

For the second time that night Angel's mouth hung open. His dark eyes bored into Doyle's.

_Buffy…pregnant …child…our child…._

His brain was putting two and two together and coming up with five.

_The shocks just keep on coming…_ Doyle interrupted Angel's train of thought by handing him an envelope.

"This should explain it to you better. I'm pretty sure that has everything in it and well you did write it yourself so…" he trailed off.

Angel nodded and stood up, taking the envelope from the Irishman. "Doyle, I.."

"Say no more until you read that." He said pointing to the letter. "Me I'm going to find a drink. I'll be downstairs when you're ready."

Angel fell back into the chair and careful opened the letter. His mind spun out a thousand different reasons and possibilities for what he'd just been told. He was already engrossed as Doyle left the room and pulled the door shut behind him.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I own nobody by Saoirse

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_If you're reading this then it means our plan to keep Saoirse safe worked. But it also means that the rest of us are dead. I hope that one of us got away with her…_

_We did enough investigation and scrying alternate realities to know that your reality is very similar to ours up to the point you left Sunnydale for L.A. Witches are very handy for that. I'll start from there._

_After being in L.A for a few months Buffy showed up at my offices. We were attacked by the Mora demon. My blood mingled with his and I turned human. I figured that if I stayed human Buffy would die. I couldn't bare the cost of us together being our own lives or other peoples so I went to the Oracles and asked them to change me back. This is where our realities go in very different directions._

_The Oracles did change me back but with a twist. The removed the happiness clause from the curse. They permanently fixed my soul to my body. They told me that together Buffy and I were strong; apart we were weak and would fail. So they sent me back to her. A vampire but whole. I moved back to Sunnydale and we made it work. We were happy._

_About a year later Buffy somehow became pregnant with my child. Believe me we still haven't figured out how that happened. It was a blessing. We were going to be a proper family at last. But faith is a cruel mistress and decided it was the perfect time for war to brake out. The demons came relentlessly in wave upon wave. I decided to move everyone to Ireland where it was safer. It is there that Saoirse was born and raised with the help of everyone. _

_Saoirse's extremely bright. She practically devours any information she can lay her hands on. You've probably noticed the power that is within her blood and believe me she is powerful. Take her training and watch her fight. You will see then. She takes more after me, you I guess, in manner than she does Buffy but she still reminds me of Buffy every time I look at her. In time you will get to know her and she you. _

_I hope you will be able to succeed where we failed. She has some part to play in this but what that is I cannot say. Keep her safe._

_Angel_

Angel put down the letter and mused. So there was a reality out there where he and Buffy had been given a chance at a somewhat normal life. For that he was thankful. He glanced over at the bed and gave a small start, Saoirse was sitting up watching him. Angel was taken aback by her eyes. Sparkling green eyes observed him intently. He had memorized those eyes years ago and they still haunted his dreams. She may have resembled him in looks but her eyes, they were all Buffy's.


End file.
